Safely summited Mount Baden Powell in the snow with my friend Katie (previous 6POP finisher). It was a beautiful day, blue skies, cold but above freezing so we didn’t have the troubles that people had on the weekend prior. The snow was mostly crunchy ice – packed down on the trail or at least where other people had made tracks (often off trail, and straight up/down the mountain), but Katie and I remained cautious going up and coming down. Patches of ice on the trail begin as soon as .5 miles in, but microspikes aren't needed until about 1.5 miles up. The section that gave me the most anxiety was right after the Wally Waldron tree on the saddle before the final ascent. There, the snow looked like huge clear chunks of ice – like crystal scree, similar to hiking in very loose/soft dirt. Go slow and steady, and make sure you have good microspikes and poles at the very least. After spending a super fun summit break (which we had to ourselves), we slowly and carefully made our way down, passing a younger couple heading up to the top. They didn't have poles, and they were off trail.

Just as we were reaching the saddle and WW tree, we heard the girl from that couple scream, and it turns out she had slipped/fallen on the north side of the mountain from basically the summit to all the way down past the Dawson Saddle side of the PCT. Based off my rough AllTrails calculations, it could have been anywhere near 100-150 ft straight down. Although we were quite far away from them, we were able to call out to them, and find out if they were ok. The male companion slid down to get her, and we could actually see him pull her up by her pack to get back on the trail. We could see her legs moving, but she was probably too much in shock to get up move. We had cell service and didn't feel like we could leave them alone, so we asked if they needed us to call for help and they said yes.

After an hour, we were greatly relieved to hear the sound of a SAR helicopter fly right over us. I called the Palmdale Sherrif’s department when I got home and was heartened to hear that the girl had been found and transported to a hospital, and that all was well. They are very lucky.